Accidentally tear gassed: Protesting nurses get caught in police shelling again

Protest enters 8th day, Provincial Nurses Association threatens to take off emergency cover if demands are not met.

KARACHI: Nurses and the paramedical staff protesting outside the Karachi continued with their protest at the Karachi Press Club on Monday, despite having to face some tear gas and water cannons.

The protest, entering its eighth day, was being conducted peacefully when police showed up armed with teargas and water canons. While police said that the riot gear was meant for members of the National Commission for Human Development (NCHD), once the shelling started, it failed differentiate between the two adjacently situated, yet different protesting camps.

Later, the Provincial Nurses Association (PNA) during a press conference threatened to take off the emergency cover if there was any further delay in the fulfillment of their demands.

PNA president Aijaz Ali Kaleri alleged that it was second time that the female nurses and other paramedical staff of their association had been attacked by the police during their protest.

Earlier, a police official, wearing a helmet and a bulletproof vest, explained that the police were targeting the protestors of National Commission for Human Development (NCHD) who were trying to march towards the red zone area. He added that at that time, the nurses and the paramedical staff were seated peacefully in their camp, which was adjacent to the NCHD camp outside the press club.

Three nurses from Thatta and a male staffer were injured and were taken to Civil Hospital and Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) respectively.

Almost ten others fainted as the mob retreated from the police, revealed Zafar Iqbal, a member of the association from National Institute of Child Health (NICH).

Public hospitals, especially tertiary care hospitals like the JPMC, NICH and Civil Hospital, are being greatly affected by the strike as no Out-Patient Departments (OPD) are being tended to and the nurses and the paramedics have also boycotted the wards and the Intensive Care Units (ICU).

Regarding the demands of the nurses and the paramedics, Kaleri questioned the delay in granting their demands, “They say that the summary is lying on the table of the chief minister, then what is taking them so long?”